The Jonathan Ross Show

Episode:

5 of 10

Transmission (TX):

Sat 09 Nov 2013

TX Confirmed:

No

Time:

9.35pm - 10.35pm

Week:

Week 46 2013 : Sat 09 Nov - Fri 15 Nov

Channel:

ITV

Published:

Tue 29 Oct 2013

Amended:

Thu 07 Nov 2013

This week on The Jonathan Ross Show, Jonathan welcomes British tennis champion Andy Murray in his first major television interview since winning Wimbledon 2013; one of the biggest music stars in the world, Celine Dion; comedian Johnny Vegas and star of stage and screen, the irrepressible John Barrowman. Plus Boyzone perform in the studio.

***Embargoed until 00:01 Friday 8th November 2013***

- ANDY MURRAY TELLS SECRET OF HOW HE WON WIMBLEDON AND BREAKS STUDIO LIGHT SENDING A TENNIS BALL INTO THE AUDIENCE. PLUS, HE SAYS HIS MUM PUTS HIM OFF DURING MATCHES AND REVEALS THAT THE DUCHESS OF CAMBRIDGE HAS ‘UNBELIEVABLE’ HANDWRITING

- CELINE DION SAYS SHE DOESN’T WANT ‘MY HEART WILL GO ON’ PLAYING AT HER FUNERAL

Andy Murray has revealed that he won Wimbledon once he realised that he might lose. In his first major interview since winning the championship, Andy said that it was once it occurred to him that he might not win, that he started to play better.

He said: “After Wimbledon last year, then I thought there was a good chance I may never win a grand slam. So that was, in some ways, actually good for me to accept that, because then I was able to deal with it a bit better and it kind of released some of the pressure on myself. Because for years I was thinking, ‘It’s going to happen. I’ll do anything it takes to try to make it happen,’ But then when it actually got into my head that actually this might not happen, I actually started to play better.

“It had been so long since a British man had won…seventy odd years, that I actually came to terms with the fact that I may not do it. Once I did that I actually started to play better.”

The tennis star was at the studio with his girlfriend, Kim, who was backstage in the green room. Andy avoided Jonathan’s teasing about when the pair will get married. However, he did talk about his mum, when he said that he avoids looking at his mum during matches as she puts him off.

He added: “I try not to. I watched the last game at Wimbledon…a couple of days after, my mum’s reactions after the points aren’t particularly helpful. In that game, I’d lose a match point and she would sort of stand up rigid, sort of saying, ‘It’s ok,’ but I’m looking at her thinking, ‘I can tell in your face, you’re thinking, ‘It’s not ok.’’ I don’t think it’s easy watching your kids playing in matches like that and you actually feel bad when you see how much stress they’re going through.

“At the final in Wimbledon, I wasn’t looking at anyone, I was just on the court focusing.”

Andy also said that the Duchess of Cambridge wrote to him after Wimbledon and that she has ‘unbelievable writing’.

He said: “After Wimbledon, his [Prince William’s] wife, wrote a letter, she has unbelievable handwriting. Amazing, amazing handwriting, and he writes like a boy.

“It just said, ‘Well done on Wimbledon.’”

Andy also said he was drug tested on the morning that he went to collect his OBE.

He said: “It was a couple of weeks ago, I was going to Buckingham Palace to receive an OBE and just literally as the car had already arrived to take us there the drug testers turned up. So, basically, there’s lots of rules with the drug testers now. You give blood then you have to sit for 15 to 20 minutes before you can give the blood.

“They say that these are random tests. It’s part of the job. Right now, with what’s going on with drugs and sport, it’s tough to trust people and the only way to get that trust back is by improving the drug testing.”

Plus, he talked about the night Rafael Nadal played a trick on him. He said: “He did prank me once in New York…basically I was sitting at dinner with my girlfriend and, during the meal…I was checking my phone and I looked at one of the messages and it was from a number I didn’t recognise and it said something like, ‘Oh my God, Andy, you look so sexy tonight. It’s a shame you’re here with your girlfriend.’ So I obviously didn’t tell my girlfriend at first, I didn’t want to ruin the meal. So I put it back in my pocket.

“Then on the way back from the meal it clicked who it was, and obviously the whole time he’d been watching me from a distance looking at this message and seeing my face.”

Andy also demonstrated his ball skills by bouncing a tennis ball on the edge of his racquet, despite not having held a racquet since his back operation. Afterwards he hit a ball into the audience and accidentally broke one of the studio lights.

Singer Celine Dion revealed that she almost didn’t sing My Heart Will Go On. She said: “I didn’t want to sing My Heart Will Go On. Thank God they didn’t listen to me. I didn’t really like the song at first. I wasn’t sure. I did another song for a movie before and it was very successful and I thought we were pushing our luck. And I said, ‘Why do we need to do this?’ Let’s not push it. We’re cruising, it’s doing well.

“And he [my husband] said, ‘Let’s just do a demo, let’s give it a try and we’ll see after.’ The demo is actually the real recording, I never sang the song again. Except three million times after that live.

“I’m going to die with this song. It’s a good problem to have, when you’re part of a classic and you know that you’re going to die with it.

“When I die though, please don’t play the song.”

John Barrowman told Jonathan about the time he injured his back riding a horse for pantomime. He said: “Last year I had to come on on a horse. It’s the first time I’ve ever ridden a horse. The second to the last matinee, I knew something was wrong…I’d trained the horse to get it to nod and do all the moves…then it would lie down and I would lie down with it.

“So I come on this day and I feel something’s wrong with the horse…I feel it kind of jittery beneath me, and then…next thing I know I’m up in the air, I’m 20 feet in the air and I’m thinking, ‘Shit, I don’t have a harness on.’ And then I land and I hear, ‘crack’. True performer, I get up, everything’s ok, I kept doing the show, I did the number and as soon as the number was done, I’m lying next to the horse and my hand starts shaking and my legs start shaking and I feel pain through my back and my legs…They took me off on a stretcher. I’m saying, ‘I want my mum.’ My cousin’s son, who’s my understudy, steps over me and says, ‘You ok? I’m going on John, where’s the costume?’”

Plus, Johnny Vegas said that he might return to Benidorm.

He said: “There’s talks of the cast, the original cast, coming back for the next series. It’s in talks, I can’t confirm anything. It would be lovely to go back. It’s one of those shows…it was one of the few things I did that my mum could watch and enjoy.”

Johnny also let Jonathan paint half of his face with a magic marker so that he could perform both halves of Neil Diamond and Barbara Streisand’s You Don’t Bring Me Flowers.

Ends

Please note the above is all taken from the recording of The Jonathan Ross Show and is subject to the show edit.